THE RAMBLER. first whom he should conclude deserving of his own confidence; therefore Caius, in admitting Titius to the affairs imparted only to himself must know that he violates his faith, since he acts contrary to the intention of Claudius, to whom that faith was given. For promises of friendship are like all others, useless and vain, unless they are made in some known sense, adjusted and acknowledged by both parties. character, and having preserved in a private and Those whom the appearance of virtue, or the It is not difficult to conceive, however, that for many reasons a man writes much better than he lives. For without entering into refined speculations, it may be shown much easier to design than to perform. A man proposes his schemes of life in a state of abstraction and disengagement, exempt from the enticements of hope, the petite, or the depressions of fear, and is in the solicitations of affection, the importunities of apsame state with him that teaches upon land the art of navigation, to whom the sea is always smooth, and the wind always prosperous. The mathematicians are well acquainted with the difference between pure science, which has to do only with ideas, and the application of its laws to the use of life, in which they are constrained to submit to the imperfection of matter and the influence of accidents. Thus, in mora. pediments obstruct our practice, which very easily discussions, it is to be remembered, that many imgive way to theory. The speculatist is only in danger of erroneous reasoning; but the man involved in life has his own passions and those of others to encounter, and is embarrassed with a thousand inconveniences which confound him with variety of impulse, and either perplex or ob struct his way. He is forced to act without de liberation, and obliged to choose before he can examine; he is surprised by sudden alterations of the state of things, and changes his measures according to superficial appearances; he is led by others, either because he is indolent, or because he is timorous; he is sometimes afraid to know what is right, and sometimes finds friends or enemies diligent to deceive him. We are, therefore, not to wonder that most fail, amidst tumult, and snares, and danger, in the observance of those precepts, which they lay down in solitude, safety, and tranquillity, with a mind unbiassed, and with liberty unobstructed. It is the condition of our present state to see more than we can attain; the exactest vigilance and caution can never maintain a single day of unmingled innocence, much less can the utmost efforts of incorporated mind reach the summits of speculative virtue. excellence before us, we may be pardoned though we sink down to humbler virtue, trying, however to keep our point always in view, and struggling not to lose ground, though we cannot gain it. It is recorded of Sir Matthew Hale, that he, for a long time, concealed the consecration of himself to the stricter duties of religion, lest, by some flagitious and shameful actions, he should bring piety into disgrace. For the same reason it may be prudent for a writer, who apprehends that he shall not enforce his own maxims by his domestic character, to conceal his name that he may not injure them. It is, however, necessary for the idea of perfection to be proposed, that we may have some object to which our endeavours are to be directed; and he that is the most deficient in the duties of life, makes some atonement for his faults, if he warns others against his own failings, and hinders, by the salubrity of his admonitions, the con-osity to gain a more familiar knowledge of suctagion of his example. Nothing is more unjust, however common, han to charge with hypocrisy him that expresses zeal for those virtues which he neglects to practise; since he may be sincerely convinced of the advantages of conquering his passions, without having yet obtained the victory, as a man may be confident of the advantages of a voyage, or a journey, without having courage or industry to undertake it, and may honestly recommend to others those attempts which he neglects himself. The interest which the corrupt part of mankind have in hardening themselves against every motive to amendment, has disposed them to give to these contradictions, when they can be produced against the cause of virtue, that weight which they will not allow them in any other case. They see men act in opposition to their interest, without supposing that they do not know it; those who give way to the sudden violence of passion, and forsake the most important pursuits for petty pleasures, are not supposed to have changed their opinions, or to approve their own conduct. In moral or religious questions alone, they determine the sentiments by the actions, and charge every man with endeavouring to impose upon the world, whose writings are not confirmed by his life. They never consider that themselves neglect or practise something every day inconsistently with their own settled judgment, nor discover that the conduct of the advocates for virtue can little increase or lessen the obligations of their dictates; argument is to be invalidated only by argument, and is in itself of the same force, whether or not it convinces him by whom it is proposed. Yet since this prejudice, however unreasonable, is always likely to have some prevalence, it is the duty of every man to take care lest he should hinder the efficacy of his own instructions. When he desires to gain the belief of others, he should show that he believes himself; and when he teaches the fitness of virtue by his reasonings, he should, by his example, prove its possibility. Thus much at least may be required of him, that he shall not act worse than others, because he writes better; nor imagine that, by the merit of his genius, he may claim indulgence, beyond mortals of the lower classes, and be excused for want of prudence, or neglect of virtue. Bacon, in his history of the winds, after having offered something to the imagination as desirable, often proposes lower advantages in its place to the reason as attainable. The same method may be sometime pursued in moral endeavours, which this philosopher has observed in natural inquiries; having first set positive and absolute There are, indeed, a great number whose curi cessful writers, is not so much prompted by an opinion of their power to improve as to delight, and who expect from them not arguments against vice, or dissertations on temperance or justice, but flights of wit, and sallies of pleasantry, or, a least, acute remarks, nice distinctions, justness of sentiment, and elegance of diction. This expectation is, indeed, specious and probable, and yet, such is the fate of all human hopes, that it is very often frustrated, and those who raise admiration by their books, disgust by their company. A man of letters, for the most part spends, in the privacies of study, that season of life in which the manners are to be softened into ease, and polished into elegance; and, when he has gained knowledge enough to be respected, has neglected the minuter acts by which he might have pleased. When he enters life, if his temper be soft and timorous, he is diffident and bashful, from the knowledge of his defects: or if he was born with spirit and resolution, he is ferocious and arrogant, from the consciousness of his merit; he is either dissipated by the awe of company, and unable to recollect his reading, and arrange his arguments; or he is hot and dogmatical, quick in opposition, and tenacious in defence, disabled by his own violence, and confused by his haste to triumph. The graces of writing and conversation are of different kinds; and though he who excels in one might have been, with opportunities and application, equally successful in the other, yet as many please, by extemporary talk, though utterly unacquainted with the more accurate method, and more laboured beauties, which composition requires; so it is very possible that men, wholly accustomed to works of study, may be without that readiness of conception, and affluence of language, always necessary to colloquial entertainment. They may want address to watch the hints which conversation offers for the display of their particular attainments, or they may be so much unfurnished with matter on common subjects, that discourse not professedly literary glides over them as heterogeneous bodies, without admitting their conceptions to mix in the circulation. A transition from an author's book to his conversation, is too often like an entrance into a large city, after a distant prospect. Remotely, we see nothing but spires of temples and turrets of palaces, and imagine it the residence of splendour, grandeur and magnificence; but, when we have passed the gates, we find it perplexed with narrow passages, disgraced with despicable cottages, embarrassed with obstructions, and cloudwith smoke. THERE is no grievance, public or private, of which, since I took upon me the office of a periodical monitor, I have received so many or so earnest complaints, as of the predominance of play; of a fatal passion for cards and dice, which seems to have overturned, not only the ambition of excellence, but the desire of pleasure; to have extinguished the flames of the lover, as well as of the patriot; and threatens, in its further progress, to destroy all distinctions, both of rank and sex, to crush all emulation but that of fraud, to corrupt all those classes of our people whose ancestors have, by their virtue, their industry, or their parsimony, given them the power of living in extravagance, idleness, and vice, and to leave them without knowledge, but of the modish games, and without wishes, but for lucky hands. I have found, by long experience, that there are few enterprises so hopeless as contests with the fashion, in which the opponents are not only made confident by their numbers, and strong by their union, but are hardened by contempt of their antagonist, whom they always look upon as a wretch of low notions, contracted views, mean conversation, and narrow fortune, who envies the elevations which he cannot reach, who would gladly embitter the happiness which his inelegance or indigence deny him to partake, and who has no other end in his advice than to revenge his own mortification by hindering those whom their birth and taste have set above him, from the enjoyment of their superiority, and bringing them down to a level with himself. Though I have never found myself much affected by this formidable censure, which I have incurred often enough to be acquainted with its full force, yet I shall, in some measure, obviate it on this occasion, by offering very little in my own name, either of argument or entreaty, since those who suffer by this general infatuation may be supposed best able to relate its effects. SIR, There seems to be so little knowledge left in the world, and so little of that reflection practised, by which knowledge is to be gained, that I am in doubt, whether I shall be understood, when I complain of want of opportunity for thinking; or whether a condemnation, which at present seems irreversible, to perpetual ignorance, will raise any compassion, either in you or your readers: : yet I will venture to lay my state before you, because I believe it is natural to most minds, to take some pleasure in complaining of evils, of which they have no reason to be ashamed. I am the daughter of a man of great fortune, whose diffidence of mankind, and perhaps the pleasure of continual accumulation, incline him to reside upon his own estate, and to educate his children in his own house, where I was bred, if not with the most brilliant examples of virtue before my eyes, at least remote enough from any incitements to vice; and, wanting neither leisure nor books, nor the acquaintance of some persons of learning in the neighbourhood, I endeavoured to acquire such knowledge as might most recommend me to esteem, and thought myself able to support a conversation upon most of the subjects, which my sex and condition made it proper for me to understand. I had, besides my knowledge, as my mamma and my maid told me, a very fine face and ele gant shape, and with all these advantages had been seventeen months the reigning toast for twelve miles round, and never came to the month. ly assembly, but I heard the old ladies that sat by wishing that it might end well, and their daughters criticising my air, my features, or my dress. You know, Mr. Rambler, that ambition is na tural to youth, and curiosity to understanding, and therefore will hear, without wonder, that I was desirous to extend my victories over those who might give more honour to the conqueror; and that I found in a country life a continual repetition of the same pleasures, which was not sufficient to fill up the mind for the present, or raise any expectations of the future; and I will confess to you, that I was impatient for a sight of the town, and filled my thoughts with the discoveries which I should make, the triumphs that I should obtain, and the praises that I should receive. At last the time came. My aunt, whose husband has a seat in Parliament, and a place at court, buried her only child, and sent for me to supply the loss. The hope that I should so far insinuate myself into their favour, as to obtain a considerable augmentation to my fortune, procured me every convenience for my departure, with great expedition; and I could not, amidst all my transports, forbear some indignation to see with what readiness the natural guardians of my virtue sold me to a state, which they thought more hazardous than it really was, as soon as a new accession of fortune glittered in their eyes. Three days I was upon the road, and on the fourth morning my heart danced at the sight of London. I was set down at my aunt's and entered upon the scene of action. I expected now, from the age and experience of my aunt, some prudential lessons; but, after the first civilities and first tears were over, was told what pity it was to have kept so fine a girl so long in the country; for the people who did not begin young, seldom dealt their cards handsomely, or played them tolerably. Young persons are commonly inclined to slight the remarks and counsels of their elders. I smiled, perhaps, with too much contempt, and was upon the point of telling her that my time had not been passed in such trivial attainments. But I soon found that things are to be estimated, not by the importance of their effects, but the frequency of their use. A few days after, my aunt gave me notice, that some company, which she had been six weeks in collecting, was to meet that evening, and she expected a finer assembly than had been seen all the winter. She expressed this in the jargon of a gamester, and, when I asked an explication of her terms of art, wondered where I had lived. I had already found my aunt so incapable of any rational conclusion, and so ignorant of every thing, whether great or little, that I had lost all regard to her opinion, and dressed myself with I do stay at home, Sir, and all the world knows great expectations of an opportunity to display I am at home every Sunday. I have had six my charms among rivals, whose competition routes this winter, and sent out ten packs of would not dishono ir me. The company came cards in invitations to private parties. As for in, and after the cursory compliments of saluta-management, I am sure he cannot call me extion, alike easy to the lowest and the highest un-travagant, or say I do not mind my family. The derstanding, what was the result? The cards children are out at nurse in villages as cheap as were broken open, the parties were formed, the any two little brats can be kept, nor have I ever whole night passed in a game, upon which the seen them since; so he has no trouble about them. young and old were equally employed; nor was The servants live at board wages. My own dinI able to attract an eye, or gain an ear, but be-ners come from the Thatched House; and I have ing compelled to play without skill I perpetually embarrassed my partner, and soon perceived the contempt of the whole table gathering upon me. I cannot but suspect, Sir, that this odious fashion is produced by a conspiracy of the old, the ugly, and the ignorant, against the young and beautiful, the witty and the gay, as a contrivance to level all distinctions of nature and of art, to confound the world in a chaos of folly, and to take from those who could outshine them all the advantages of mind and body, to withhold youth from its natural pleasures, deprive wit of its influence, and beauty of its charms, to fix those hearts upon money, to which love has hitherto been entitled, to sink life into a tedious uniformity, and to allow it no other hopes or fears, but those of robbing, and being robbed. never paid a penny for any thing I have bought since I was married. As for play, I do think I may, indeed, indulge in that, now I am my own mistress. Papa made me drudge at whist till I was tired of it; and, far from wanting a head, Mr. Hoyle, when he had not given me above forty lessons, said I was one of his best scholars. I thought then with myself, that, if once I was at liberty, I would leave play, and take to reading romances, things so forbidden at our house, and so railed at, that it was impossible not to fancy them very charming. Most fortunately, to save me from absolute undutifulness, just as I was married, came dear brag into fashion, and ever since it has been the joy of my life; so easy, so cheerful and careless, so void of thought, and so genteel! Who can help loving it? Yet the perfidious thing has used me very ill of late, and toBe pleased, Sir, to inform those of my sex who morrow I should have changed it for faro. But, have minds capable of nobler sentiments, that, oh! this detestable to-morrow, a thing always exif they will unite in vindication of their pleasures pected, and never found.—Within these few and their prerogatives, they may fix a time, at hours must I be dragged into the country. The which cards shall cease to be in fashion, or be wretch, Sir, left me in a fit, which his threatenleft only to those who have neither beauty to beings had occasioned, and unmercifully ordered a loved, nor spirit to be feared; neither knowledge to teach, nor modesty to learn; and who, having passed their youth in vice, are justly condemned to spend their age in folly. I am, Sir, &c. CLEORA. post-chaise. Stay I cannot, for money I have none, and credit I cannot get.-But I will make the monkey play with me at picquet upon the road for all I want. I am almost sure to beat him, and his debts of honour I know he will pay. Then who can tell but I may still come back and conquer Lady Packer; Sir, you need not print this last scheme; and, upon second thoughts, you may. -Oh, distraction! the post chaise is at the door, Sir, publish what you will, only let it be printed without a name. Torrens dicendi copia multis, SIR, VEXATION will burst my heart, if I do not give it vent. As you publish a paper, I insist upon it that you insert this in your next, as ever you hope for the kindness and encouragement of any woman of taste, spirit, and virtue. I would have it published to the world, how deserving wives are used by imperious coxcombs, that henceforth no woman may marry who has not the patience of No. 16.] SATURDAY, MAY 12, 1750. Grizzel. Nay, if even Grizzel had been married to a gamester, her temper would never have held out. A wretch that loses his good humour and humanity along with his money, and will not allow enough from his own extravagances to support a woman of fashion in the necessary amusements of life! Why does not he employ his wise head to make a figure in parliament, raise an estate, and get a title? That would be fitter for the master of a family, than rattling a noisy dice-box; and then he might indulge his wife in a few slight expenses and elegant diversions. What if I was unfortunate at brag? should he not have stayed to see how luck would turn another time? Instead of that, what does he do, but picks a quarrel, upbraids me with loss of beauty, abuses my acquaintance, ridicules my play, and insults my understanding; says forsooth, that women have not heads enough to play with any thing but dolls, and that they should be employed in things proportionable to their understanding, keep at home, and mind family affairs. Some who the depths of eloquence have found, SIR, I AM the modest young man whom you favoured with your advice in a late paper; and as I am very far from suspecting that you foresaw the numberless inconveniences which I have, by following it, brought upon myself, I will lay my condition open before you, for you seem bound to extricate me from the perplexities in which your counsel, however innocent in the intention, has contributed to involve me. -Facilis descencus Averni, The gates of hell are open night and day; VIRG DRYDEN for to escape from the pain of hearing myself exalted above the greatest names, dead and living, of the learned world, it has already cost me two hogsheads of port, fifteen gallons of arrack, ten dozen of claret, and five-and-forty bottles of The means of doing hurt to ourselves are always at hand. I immediately sent to a printer, and contracted with him for an impression of several thousands of my pamphlet. While it was at the press, I was seldom absent from the printing-house, and continually urged the work-champaign. men, to haste, by solicitations, promises, and rewards. From the day all other pleasures were excluded, by the delightful employment of correcting the sheets; and from the night, sleep was generally banished, by anticipations of the happiness which every hour was bringing nearer. At last the time of publication approached, and my heart beat with the raptures of an author. I was above all little precautions, and, in defiance of envy or of criticism, set my name upon the title, without sufficiently considering, that what has once passed the press is irrevocable, and that though the printing-house may properly be compared to the infernal regions, for the facility of its entrance, and the difficulty with which authors return from it; yet there is this difference, that a great genius can never return to his former state, by a happy draught of the waters of oblivion. I was resolved to stay at home no longer, and therefore rose early and went to the coffeehouse; but found that I had now made myself too eminent for happiness, and that I was no longer to enjoy the pleasure of mixing, upon equal terms, with the rest of the world. As soon as I enter the room, I see part of the company raging with envy, which they endeavour to conceal, sometimes with the appearance of laughter, and sometimes with that of contempt; but the disguise is such, that I can discover the secret rancour of their hearts, and as envy is deservedly its own punishment, I frequently indulge myself in tormenting them with my presence. But though there may be some slight satisfaction received from the mortification of my enemies, yet my benevolence will not suffer me to take any pleasure in the terrors of my friends, 1 have been cautious, since the appearance of my I am now, Mr. Rambler, known to be an au- work, not to give myself more premeditated airs thor, and am conderaned, irreversibly condemned, of superiority, than the most rigid humility might to all the miseries of high reputation. The first allow. It is, indeed, not impossible that I may morning after publication my friends assembled sometimes have laid down my opinion, in a about me; 1 presented each, as is usual, with a manner that showed a consciousness of my ability copy of my book. They looked into the first to maintain it, or interrupted the conversation, pages, but were hindered, by their admiration, when I saw its tendency, without suffering the from reading further. The first pages are, in- speaker to waste his time in explaining his sentideed, very elaborate. Some passages they par- ments; and, indeed, I did indulge myself for two ticularly dwelt upon, as more eminently beautiful days in a custom of drumming with my fingers, than the rest; and some delicate strokes, and when the company began to lose themselves in secret elegancies, I pointed out to them, which absurdities, or to encroach upon subjects which had escaped their observation. I then begged I knew them unqualified to discuss. But I geof them to forbear their compliments, and invit-nerally acted with great appearance of respect, ed them, I could do no less, to dine with me at even to those whose stupidity I pitied in my a tavern. After dinner, the book was resumed; heart. Yet, notwithstanding this exemplary mobut their praises very often so much overpower-deration, so universal is the dread of uncommon ed my modesty, that I was forced to put about powers, and such the unwillingness of mankind the glass, and had often no means of repressing to be made wiser, that I have now for some days the clamours of their admiration, but by thundering to the drawer for another bottle. Next morning another set of my acquaintance congratulated me upon my performance, with such importunity of praise, that I was again forced to obviate their civilities by a treat. On the third day, I had yet a greater number of applauders to put to silence in the same manner; and, on the fourth, those whom I had entertained the first day came again, having, in the perusal of the remaining part of the book, discovered so many forcible sentences and masterly touches, that it was impossible for me to bear the repetition of their commendations. I therefore persuaded them once more to adjourn to the tavern, and choose some other subject, on which I might share in their conversation. But it was not in their power to withhold their attention from my performance, which had so entirely taken possession of their minds, that no entreaties of mine could change their topic, and I was obliged to stifle, with claret, that praise, which neither my modesty could hinder, nor my uneasiness re found myself shunned by all my acquaintance. If I knock at a door, nobody is at home; if I enter a coffee-house, I have the box to myself. I live in the town like a lion in his desert, or an eagle on his rock, too great for friendship or society, and condemned to solitude by unhappy elevation and dreaded ascendency. Nor is my character only formidable to others, but burdensome to myself. I naturally love to talk without much thinking, to scatter my mer riment at random, and to relax my thoughts with ludicrous remarks and fanciful images; but such is now the importance of my opinion, that I am afraid to offer it, lest, by being established too hastily into a maxim, it should be the occasion of error to half the nation; and such is the expectation with which I am attended, when I am going to speak, that I frequently pause to reflect, whether what I am about to utter is worthy of myself. This, Sir, is sufficiently miserable; but there are still greater calamities behind. You must have read in Pope and Swift how men of parts have had their closets rifled, and their cabinets broken open, at the instigation of piratical booksellers, for the profit of their works; and it is apparent that there are many prints now sold in the shops, of men whom you cannot suspect of |